#it’s such a key part of the show to me

[gldnstrngs]

the way merlin and arthur speak with their eyes is so beautiful

[myoonmii]

I keep thinking about Merlin’s love for Arthur and how it’s so clearly portrayed in the show to the point that it practically drives the plot of the show. However when it comes to Arthur’s love for Merlin it’s more subtle and sometimes difficult to even grasp, and I started thinking why that was, aside from the obvious fact that Arthur has a lot of trouble expressing his emotions affection or otherwise. I think it also lies in the fact that Merlin knows Arthur intrinsically throughout the show; he is one of the closest people to Arthur, and sees him for who he really is. Arthur admits as much.

Sure, Arthur knows Merlin but the main part of the plot is that he really doesn't know Merlin. Merlin wants him to desperately understand him and “see me for who I am” but he can't yet. And I think this subconsciously creates a barrier in the way in which Arthur can care for Merlin, and how Merlin can let himself be seen by Arthur.

Which is why I think he was also so hurt when the magic reveal happens because more than the betrayal of Merlin having magic, it was the betrayal of Merlin not letting Arthur see him for who he really is and for hiding a main part of himself. Arthur says it himself “why did you never tell me” that’s what hurt him the most.

I think the most damning piece of evidence for this is the fact that while we see snippets of Arthur’s feelings for Merlin thought the show, the biggest signs are in the last episode after the magic reveal; in which he finally gets to understand Merlin, and this time REALLY know Merlin, and as the barriers of what held them back from understanding each other truly fall away, Arthur evidently “falls in love with Merlin all over again”. We see him actually express himself to Merlin.

This is another reason why I think if anyone was ever to create another season of Merlin after Arthur’s return, it’s physically impossible not to make it about Merlin and Arthur acknowledging their feelings for each other. Because there is no way forward without them acknowledging how deeply they care for each other, obviously anyone is free to argue what kind of love that is, but its impossible not to see the deep love there either way.

They always knew they loved each other, just maybe never realising how much and what that means, because its almost second nature to everything that they do.

[arthursfuckinghat]

"I was gonna say you're like a son to me.. but you're more than that."

"It ain't that complicated!"

How quickly that shoulder pat of comfort turned into a condescending one.

[kradogsrats]

the first of a new breed

[rush-the-stars]

i’ve said this before but vash views brats with a lot of sympathy and he’s unintentionally a pretty good tamer. he doesn’t do it purposely mostly. however. the somewhat condescending pity he gives you is. infuriating.

[lizzybeeee]

(Same anon) It's also just a lot harder for me because Solas in Inquisition was trying to take down the Veil in a world that was genuinely shitty to elves, mages, and spirits (nvm that until this game I was 100% sure that he was trying to do this more for the ancient elves, like why else imply there are more out there to Abelas? I guess he was just being polite?) Veilguard depicts Thedas as being largely okay with mages and spirits even outside of Tevinter and pointedly doesn't depict racism against elves outside a handful of throwaway lines. So they had him going at this with the same conviction from DAI, of a man trying to reverse the slow genocide of his people, but they've boiled his motivations down to "The Veil is unnatural" Like. How much more awesome if we could have convinced him not to destroy the world because of a culmination of choices in this game and all the others that made Thedas a kinder place idk man. ngnegnwgnf sorry for ranting in your inbox, I still liked Solas enough in this game but it was really bittersweet that they just dumbed down his motivations. I love your idea for influencing the Inky though, it definitely should have been a choice closer to the end and allowed for more variations (ideally all Inkies should have that, not just the Solavellans)

Hello again, Anon! :)

100% agree that the sanitization of the world and lore absolutely hurts Solas's motivations - especially if you look at it solely from what Veilguard gives us and with no background from previous games. All of the previous games, mostly Origins, were really effective in conveying how shit life could be for an elf - and how inbuilt this prejudice against the elves was in all aspects of Thedas.

The chant of light removing the canticle of Shartan, the march on the Dales, the struggles of the Dalish to simply live, the treatment of elves by the ruling class/chantry/ and others in general...it all painted such a bleak outlook for the elves and showed how ingrained this prejudice was in all aspects of Thedas. They had no way out - the structures of power in Thedas would fight them at every turn - which was why Solas being set up as a way for them to fight against all these systems was so compelling! You want the elves to win - but it will be at the cost of everything else if Solas goes ahead with his plan.

(You can definitely also make an argument that perhaps he's using them just to restore the world from before -> Felassan argued with him about this: to see the world as it was as real and worth improving.)

DATV felt divorced from the previous games, and its reluctance to meaningfully go into issues surrounding the lives of elves in Thedas - all the ugliness that brings - really did nothing to add to Solas's motivations for bringing down the Veil. If anything, I got the impression that he does not see anyone in Thedas as being 'real' and that he's simply doing it out of regret and to soothe his own ego/guilt. If this game wanted me to be sympathetic towards Solas it didn't do a good job of making me feel it, especially when you look at the totality of everything that Solas has done.

What I took from Trespasser was that Solas wanted to heal the wound he had left on the world - the Veil - and what he had inadvertently done to the elves. He had given everything he had to free the elven people from oppression and tyranny, only to inadvertently leave them vulnerable to the same oppression from others -> taking away their magic and long lives in the process. He was so blinded by his goal (stopping the evanuris) that he failed to see what his own actions might have wrought in the process.

Trespasser set up the 'Elven Rebellion 2.0' with a Solas who was torn between the world he once knew and the world it had become in spite of his intentions. Does he truly care about the elven people in current Thedas? Or does he just care about the world that came before? In DAI he was such a fascinating character because he could be so polarizing! People loved him! People hated him! Both were correct!

But starting the game with the ritual, sanitizing the world (no real signs of conflicts about spirits, mages, elves, anything really etc...), and simplifying his motivations to "fix fade -> be immortal/magic -> profit"...it just feels so shallow.

Solas: "Long before we met, I failed my oldest friend. She died for that failure. If I leave the Veil in place, I am destroying the world she wanted."

He spells his motivations out pretty clearly at the end and it's just...Mythal? He doesn't seem to care about the elves that are currently living in Thedas - not even Lavellan. Like you said, in Tresspasser I also got the impression that he wanted stop the slow genocide of his people. But apparently it was 'Mythal All Along'!

The lack of supporters/agents really gives him no credence to say that this is anything that the elves want - elven Rook can even call him out on it and he doesn't care. For a character whose own trauma began with bring coerced into a body he didn't want he doesn't give a shit about doing the same to thousands of other elves.

It's far less compelling, to me at least, than what I felt was set up in DAI: the Dread Wolf, god of rebellion, rallying elves after ages of systematic abuse and oppression with the goal of liberating his people and restoring the world that was - the world he inadvertantly denied them with the consequences of his actions. Instead it's just Solas doing his own thing because he's right and he needs to fix what he did wrong for Mythal.

It would have been great to be able to convince him to change his mind/ pursue another path as a result of the culmination of our actions throughout the series. It could be a nice nod to our past decisions and a nice conclusion to see the results of those choice in missives/codex entries. Same as the 'south can repel the blight' counter idea, have their be some kind of 'convince Solas to pursue another option' tally that demonstrates that this world is willing to change and he should be too.

[pumpkinrootbeer]

Eugene was truly the best boyfriend. saw his girlfriend get broken up with, and immediately had a revenge glow up. Imagine being Cassandra seeing your ex girlfriend's boyfriend and he's wearing a golden choker with the just deepest v neck known to man, the world's sluttiest gloves, and a thigh garter. I'd have to give up then and there.

[inarmes]

wanting you to know if that you aren't writing haymitch absolutely battered by his grief and also rendered weak by his alcoholism (see; tremors for example) i want you to know that you're doing an awful job. i want you to know that he is not the flirty, sarcastic mentor-type character you've assumed of him but shrunken, hermited, awkward, sarcastic to cope, pained and absolutely ultimately his own savior throughout it all.

[zukkaoru]

it irks me SO BAD when people take away / lessen dazai’s bandages when he’s clearly in a public setting. why does he only have a random circle of bandages around his neck at work. why are his forearms on display at a public beach. why do you think him wearing bandages all the time is something that needs to be fixed. why can’t it just be a preference he has that you respect like all the characters in-show do. why are you stripping him down and pretending that’s the only way he can heal. why do you think there’s something wrong with him not having any skin on display. this goes quadruple for femzai; if you take away dazai’s bandages for your femzai design i’m going to show up on your doorstep with a gun. why do you think she needs to show skin. why do you think the bandages are a problem. tell me quickly, and if your answer is just misogyny or ableism, i’m activating the saw trap.

[sforzesco]

crassus & pompey (sometime during sulla's civil war, in spoletium)

it's uhhhhh about pompey and alexander the great and the cynic epistles bit about hephaestion's thighs altho in this case the thighs are how crassus could bring pompey to a political standstill when he wanted to. in a narrative, politics can be a dialogue adjacent to foreplay and sex or something. etc etc. the general 'you're the only motherfucker in this city who can handle me,' and odi et amo of it all.

The Defeat of Rome: Crassus, Carrhae and the Invasion of the East, Gareth C. Sampson

(also many thanks @illegible-scribble for telling me about hephaestion's thighs and adding several new layers of Thoughts to All Of This)

society6 | ko-fi | twitter (pillowfort, cohost) | deviantart

[meep-meep-richie]

I’m happy for Ke Huy; but i feel like Owen is robbed here; cause he slayed in S2 of Loki. But you know what bothers me the most?! The hate Owen mostly get for his roles; which i think is absolutely ridiculous; but whenever he actually does an amazing job he never gets the recognition either…cause someone else always did better..just give credit where credit is due🙏🏻

[seaweedstarshine]

Hi! Long time no yap but I've been really bothered by this thing and I know you're just the person I can go to with this (even if we don't always end up agreeing at times).

I got into a tiff with someone in a comments section of a post that was about Amy (Which character do you think deserved to become a villain? or something similar). They brought up Amy's abuse of her boyfriend. I may have tried to defend Amy (key word is tried. I am officially rubbish at debating) but then I may have said something? Because they said that I (and apparently a lot of other fans) was excusing Amy's abuse because of her trauma. It got me stumped because isn't young Amy's treatment of Rory rooted in her trauma? Did I miss the memo where we separate trauma and abuse? Am I missing something?

That statement bothered me a lot because if there's one thing I never want to do it's defend an abuser. So here I am, humbly asking and hoping to clear the muddy waters.

Your really confused and disturbed moot, Tia 💌

TIA!!!!! Thanks for the ask 💌 , and I send you all the hugs.

Discussion of abuse, trauma, ableism, infidelity, and unhealthy relationship dynamics beneath the cut.

(First off… while I really appreciate your faith in my explaining skills <3 <3 <3 my passion for traumatized characters and mentally ill+neurodivergent rights doesn't make me especially qualified to fully clear muddy waters especially not knowing the full context, but I feel you, and what follows is my informed perspective!)

Speaking generally first, harm done in media is best examined by the impact on the audience, with a different lens than harm done to real people. While relatable experiences in media can be useful and validating and incredibly important, you can’t be “defending an abuser” when the abuse is fictional. It's actually normal for traumatized/ND/mentally ill people to project onto mentally ill villains, when villains are the only significant representation for those stigmatized symptoms in a media landscape that excludes and demonizes us simply for existing. RTD can't stop people who hallucinate from reclaiming the Master's Drums and projecting onto the Master, for example — 90% of the best Doctor Who psychosis fic by psychotic authors is about the Master, whether RTD likes it or not. It's not true crime.

(This is speaking generally. Amy Pond is very much not the Master.)

Abuse is a behavior, and there can be many reasons for it, but reasons based in trauma don’t make it not abuse (some forms of generational trauma can propagate abusive parenting styles, when the parent thinks abusive parenting is normal, or lives entirely vicariously through their child). This absolutely should not be taken to mean trauma correlates with abusive behavior; rather that abusive behaviors from traumatized people are more likely to present in specific ways.

Abuse is also a targeted behavior, based in control — not consistently displayed C-PTSD symptoms as seen in Season 5 Amy Pond through many aspects of her life. Mental health symptoms don't become abuse just because they hinder one partner from meeting the other partner's needs. Any life event can do that.

Without knowing the context of the arguments, this is the aspect of their relationship I've seen you talk about before (which I also feel strongly about), and what I assume is what you were debating? So, here I will talk specifically in regard to Season 5.

We all know Amy — she's never attached to Leadworth because she never wanted to leave Scotland, no steady therapist because none of them stick up for her, can't stick with one job yet her first choice is a job that simulates intimacy because her avoidant behavior (a known trauma response) isn't sustainable to her wellbeing. Rory knows her fears of commitment stem from her repeated abandonments, it’s why he’ll always wait for her, and it's why he blames the Doctor “You make it so they don't want to let you down.”, who apart from having caused a lot of her trauma, has actively taken advantage of her being the “Scottish girl in the English village” who's “still got that accent,” because he wants to feel important, so yeah, I think interpreting Amy's issues (and how Amy and Rory transverse them) as Amy abusing Rory indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of their relationship, as well as a misunderstanding of the (raggedy) Doctor’s role in Amy’s formative self-image (which of course she works through in Season 6, but I am sticking to Season 5).

Abuse is always based in control. That just doesn’t fit here. While Amy's detachment from her real life includes things like calling Rory her “kind of boyfriend” (which she is upfront about to his face; differing commitment levels isn't abuse, though it can be a relationship red flag for both parties IRL) — her Season 5 disregard of Rory’s feelings occurs only in response to the fairytale embodiment of her trauma. It's never a response to Rory; it's a response to the Doctor, who stole her childhood and led her by the hand to her death. She cheats on Rory with the Doctor in her bedroom full of Doctor toys, drawings, models, she made from childhood to early adulthood.

(And yes, like many repeatedly-traumatized people, Amy is prone to being sensitive and reactive. Take her “Well, shut up then!” line in The Big Bang; but given Rory responds to this by hugging her, clearly he doesn’t take it as her actually dismissing him. He knows her better than that.)

And by no means do I meant to imply this is fair to young Rory, poor Rory, who's left struggling with the feeling that his role in her life is in competition with the role of her trauma (aka the Doctor). But not every unhealthy relationship dynamic is unhealthy because of abuse. Labelling Amy's treatment of Rory in Season 5 more accurately isn't the same as excusing her harmful choices — but making mistakes is part of being human, Amy's mistakes are certainly understandable, and she works through them out of love for Rory.

If there's one thing to say about Moffat women, it's that Moffat allows his female characters the same grace that the male characters *coughTENcough* have always had, to hurt and struggle and make realistic mistakes and overcome those mistakes and to heal without being demonized.

Amy isn't perfect, but she is a fully realized character, and her story gives us a resonant depiction of childhood trauma.

[camellcat]

you ever realize you never properly learned how to say a character's name, so by the time you finally HEAR it, you have no idea who they're talking about? cause I feel like I keep doing this and it's very confusing to keep being corrected like that

[bookshelf-in-progress]

Number of stories I would like to write: Many.

Number of stories I find myself able to write: Zero.

[proveagain]

i rewatched s6 p2 earlier this week with my dad, and sorry i'm gonna ramble again because going from the frustrated scenes that lead to the locker room blowup -> the plane heart-to-heart with j.ohnny -> the 'you're a natural leader' convo with r.obby after he lands just feels SO clunky... i thought it was just because i had binged all the eps at like 2-3am that first night, but now i can tell there's at least one or two scenes in there that they cut for time. i'm not disagreeing with m.iguel's reaction to the 'you're my son, too' line because i know that's been something he's been needing to hear since after prom in s4, but the show insinuating that m.iguel's frustration is solely because j.ohnny has been favoring r.obby over him (i know whatever scene that was got cut for time bc ... vine vc bitch where) comes out of nowhere???

firstly because the 'support' j.ohnny gave r.obby didn't make it off the cutting room floor (i know he's not talking abt part 1 bc j.ohnny made a point to be unbiased and support m.iguel and r.obby evenly before the captain qualifier), but also because feeling ignored by j.ohnny was never even hinted to as a motive for the desperation m.iguel has with the captain spot in 6 part 1. he and r.obby had figured out their shit from that type of thing in s5 (another thing the writers tell instead of show but that's a rant for another time). his whole desperation for winning the taikai is that m.iguel thinks it's his only shot at swaying the stanford admissions board. he was giving d.emetri a run for his money in the 'shut tf up abt college' race in 6 part 1, and he was so preoccupied with his plan to get noticed and change the board's mind that he completely ignored and invalidated r.obby's feelings.

the main reason he's upset with j.ohnny - and with everything at that point - is that everything comes back to that lack of control he's felt on and off since season 3. j.ohnny just finished telling everyone that the results of the taikai could have them 'regretting everything for the rest of their lives' (get that '84 guilt out of here), right after telling m.iguel that his own victory on the mini platforms didn't mean shit (the only time where m.iguel did feel ignored by j.ohnny, and it wasn't to hype up r.obby bc j.ohnny sat there yelling at everyone in the locker room after), and that he the rest of the team were still going under. they're on the way back to los angeles because his mom got rushed to emergency surgery, another thing he has no control over. there's a couple lines from j.ohnny about 'not thinking like that' when j.ohnny's sharing his worry about not having control re: c.armen's situation, but i don't think that was stressed nearly enough to progress his narrative and show that correction. ideally, i think doubling down on that with a heart-to-heart with c.armen in the hospital about m.iguel fearing the risk of something happening to her again would have done that really well.

that mention of the real motive was also missing from his pep talk with r.obby after he gets back to barcelona, watered down to 'oh i was being an asshole sorry,' and i think it was a disservice to the bond they keep trying to say m.iguel and r.obby have had since s5. a lot of their 'fixing things' convos get watered down to the most basic shit, when the very core of their 5+ season conflict has always been abt miscommunication. they deserved a longer scene talking about both m.iguel and r.obby's frustrations before m.iguel started hyping him up, and i know they glossed over it because of time.

tldr: if i had a dollar for every time a character got cheated because of the short eps + cluttered character roster i'd have enough money to buy the show myself

[the-busy-ghost]

Me normally: Let people love what they love

Me, after a Test Match Special commentator expresses their belief that the new All Creatures Great and Small is somehow "better" than the 1978 version: This is pure insanity and TMS can no longer be trusted on anything, how can they even be trusted to know about cricket, do they have no TASTE